During the past two decades a variety of archaeological research projects focused on the Indus civilization have made it possible to refine earlier models regarding the origin and character of this distinctive urban society.
Environmental Changes and Human Impact Along the Cost of Las Bela (Balochistan, Pakistan) Between the 8th and 5th Millenium BP
An examination of traditional pottery methods and practices in light of an exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. in 1987.
A look at shell-midden and cemetery sites discovered in Oman that date back to the fifth millenium BCE, testifying to the levels of development in areas around the Indus Valley civilization thousands of years before it reached its peak.
A fascinating, well-documented article on Indus city layouts and linguistic paradigms.
One of the first articles to explore the significance of the Rohri flint mines near Mohenjo-daro, who use reaches back hundreds of thousands of years and which played an important role in the ancient Indus civilization as well.
This paper will summarize the available literature and recent discoveries on the production and use of metals by peoples of the Indus Valley,Tradition of Pakistan and Western India.
Some of the major new perspectives on the Indus Civilization that are the result of new discoveries at sites in the core regions of the Indus Civilization found in both Pakistan and India.
Building on previous statistical approaches, the application of tools like n-gram Markov chains to analyze the syntax of the Indus script and form the basis for the development of a stochastic grammar to explore the syntax of the Indus script in greater detail.
This paper in honor of Jean-Claude Gardin, in the words of the abstract, refers to a small body of work in order to scrutinize the way in which archaeologists of South Asia make inferences about long-enduring traditions.
The vast mounded remains of the ancient city of Harappa, one of the largest sites of the Indus Valley civilization, have been known by scholars for more than one hundred years. Occupied almost continuously for more than five thousand years, Harappa's ancient ruins represent the traces of one of the earliest cities of the world, and even today one-third of the area is still occupied by the modern and thriving city of Harappa.
An analysis of a skeletal collection from Harappa contradicts the dehumanizing, unrealistic myth of the Indus Civilization as an exceptionally peaceful prehistoric urban civilization.
An overview of the important technological and organization aspects of the carnelian bead industry that will be useful in developing interpretive models regarding the role of agate bead production in early urban societies.
This complexity and variety of lithic (stone) production during the Indus Civilisation.
Khambhat in Gujarat province provides a unique opportunity to study the organization of a specialized craft and understand how different aspects of social, economic and political organization relating to such crafts might be reflected in the archaeological record because of the long continuity of bead-making in this region,
As the study of beads becomes more precise, it is also important to develop more comprehensive chronological frameworks to track the changes in bead technologies and styles.
A brief introduction to the Indus Tradition and then focuses on the range of images relating to human and animal interactions that were used in the greater Indus region.
Excavations on two of the major mounds at Harappa have revealed traces of an early settlement, a transitional phase of development, and several phases of full urban and post-urban occupation.
An overview of the types of artifacts that inform us about ancient Harappan measurement systems in order to gain insight into their concepts of order and cosmology.
The assemblage of inscribed and incised objects discovered at the site of Harappa during excavations conducted between 1986–2007 by the Harappa Archaeological Research Project (HARP).
A 78 page overview of how 5 seasons of excavations at Harappa proceeded.
Archaeologists studying the emergence of early civilizations often focus on finely crafted art objects in order to understand the aspects of economic, socio-political and religious organization. The importance of such objects is increased when studying early societies for which there are no written records, such as the Indus Valley civilization.
Recent discussions on the nature of early state societies have led some scholars to suggest that the early urban phenomenon of the Indus Civilization should not be characterized as a state level society. This paper will critically examine these arguments in the context of current studies of the Indus Civilization and recent excavations at Harappa, Pakistan.
The various types of materials present at this site reveal a complex network of trade and exchange that spread throughout the Indus Valley.
Recent observations of artisans in Peshawar, Pakistan suggest that some techniques for making beads and other ornaments from lapis lazuli have not changed over the millennia.
A Preliminary Report on the site of Baghor I, located almost at the base of the Kaimur escarpment some 4km north-east of, Maraoli village, Sidhi District, India.
The objectives of this excavation were to expose an horizontal area of the coarse Lower Member of the Sihawal Formation and to try to determine the context of Lower Palaeolithic artifacts which were eroding out from this formation.
New studies are beginning to reveal details of the complexity and character of this protohistoric urban society that were not appreciated by earlier scholars.
Archaeologists interested in ancient craft production, both those aided by ancient historical sources and those bound to the interpretation of material residues, are currently involved in major critical efforts to improve the quality of their interpretation of the archaeological record.
Archaeologically preserved symbols in the form of artifacts and architecture are the primary category of data available to scholars studying the development of early state level society in South Asia.
